Beogram 4000 TT schematic.

**I presume you've tried B&O themselves? You will need to supply the Type Number, as well as model number. B&O regularly issue variants on their model numbers.

--
Trevor Wilson
www.rageaudio.com.au

I eventually got an email off to someone at B&O in their service section, but no reply yet.

Maybe I have to buy the service manual. I had hoped someone migh have had experience with these complicated POS TTs.

**I'll ask the question again: What is the Type Number?

--
Trevor Wilson
www.rageaudio.com.au

Calling it a POS is likely to elicit help, NOT. IMO they were one of the best *fully automatic* turntables around. Not only do they look good, but I could trust other people to use it, while keeping the real turntable for my personal use :-)

BTW, if you think the circuit is "complicated", that says more about your electronics knowledge.

MrT.

After several attempts to get this POS working, and after it merrily developed more and more faults in the weeks after, the repair which I am supposed to guranteee for 3 mths has turned into an unprofitable disaster.

I know crap when I see it, and every bit of B&O design wizardry is entirely wasted on folks like me..

The sound is nothing great. My old Thorens TD160 with a Denon MC is simpler and better sounding.

Who gives a shit how marvellous it looks?

The 4000 is like blonde who can't cook or root and costs a lot to run.

Its VERY complicated compared to my better sounding Thorens!

Your accusation shows the world you are a poor judge of humans and their capabilities.

Good design always includes the "easy to fix factor" B&O don't. Their 8000 series receivers are nightmares to work on. Its all just expensive garbage afaiac.

In this case I will do my best to fix the critter for the 3rd time, but its problems are ruining the reputation of both B&O and myself, as far as the customer is concerned.

Patrick Turner.

I see you're a man of the 21st Century. :-)

That's an admission of your ability only.

We can agree on that I guess.

And my Thorens TD125II is even better, but its not fully automatic.

Not you obviously, but some people don't live in dives.

your

Mine too, but irrelevant.

You did post the problems you have fixing something quite simple.

Never seen an 8000 series reciever. Can't see the relevance to you TT problem.

Not true, if they had of taken it to an authorised B&O repair centre, it would probably have been fixed first time around. Since you have no knowledge of, or experience with the model, then they must expect you are simply playing around and learning as you go.

MrT.

I am proud to be what a man could be for any century, I will not suffer fools gladly, or bludgers, or time wasters, or whingers, or poor audio designs that are difficult to service or diagnose.

Patrick Turner.

My very highly trained and experienced employee found it difficult to diagnose faults and effect a repair.

There is no admission of my abilities.

But there is a demonstration of your stupidity in being so rash.

Something's automaticness doesn't make it a superior audio product. But sure, TD125II may indeed be a nice TT; I have never owned one. I quite like the TD124.....

There you go again, being a pueurile idiot in making a stupid assumption and conclusion.

But the 4000 isn't simple. When you remove the covers acres of electronics boards greet the eye. There is a pile of opto electronics, sensitive and easily stuffable electro-mechanics.

I'm illustrating the general idea that B&O produces gear that is difficult to service if anything goes wrong, and it does.

I should NEVER have to take any bit of 30+ yr old junk to an authorized repair place where they usually charge an arm and a leg for a repair. Any TT should be repairable by the average tech without much bother. There are piles of horror stories about gear dissapearing for months at authorized places, coming back with the faults still present, not all fixed, and then there was no repair guy in the ACT and so the gear would have had to have been sent some place with great risk of further damage and more expense.

I am becoming an expert about B&O, and not enjoying it.

I could say the same about many other high end brands.

The B&O website fails to provide any info on who is there guy near me. David Jones sells the stuff as well as others in Sydney, and I'd have to contact them to find out who the repair guy is. He may not be a specialist who only does B&O.

But we will get this mess of a thing working for longer than 3 record plays and hopefully it will run ok for years. Me and my guy have repaired maybe hundreds of items, and we get very very few comebacks.

Posting about it here tested the waters to see if there was anyone with experience of servicing the model, but it appears I only drew nittpickers.

Patrick Turner.

Ask anyone who has tried to get something repaired in recent times and you can sit back and let the horror stories roll and that includes so called authorised repairers. I for one would rather take my out of warranty equipment to someone genuine as Patric appears to be than to one of those 'authorised' places. Gordon

On Wed, 11 May 2005 20:30:30 +1000, "Mr.T" put finger to keyboard and composed:

If the unit is indeed 33 years old, I wonder how many of the service techs working in the industry today would be familiar with it, or with turntables of any kind. I suspect most of the experienced techs would either be retired, or running their own businesses. Furthermore, I would expect that the only advantage in taking the TT to an authorised service centre would be that they would have unfettered access to schematics and spares, if they still exist.

- Franc Zabkar

--
Please remove one 's' from my address when replying by email.

Agreed. The trick is to find someone honest and reliable. Patrick obviously is, but we only know that through his postings here. How does one gauge the ethical standards of one's local repairer without first risking a horrid, expensive experience.

I emailed B&O at the contact for service. B&O list the sales people in Oz, not the name of the service ppl.

Their info was useless.

The unit has a parallel tracking arm.

A motor drives the arm across the record using a lighsource and opto sensors to work a diff amp to work the motor which winds the arm carriage along by turning a threaded rod througha nylon nut.

All the functions of arm movement are via press buttons on the front.

But the arm chatters angrily when it stops after some movement as a result of pressing start or changing tracks. A solenoid is used to raise and lower the arm which is fitted with a damper to slow movement. But my tech couldn't figure it out fully, although he did manage to repair the PSU which failed after I tested it when the client retunred the unit when the functions made the arm buzz around. I spent 3 hours, and found a tiny peice of broken plastic and where it had come from and sure the plastic part was not secure so I made a metal reinforcing bracket to bring the mechanism back to stiff as it had once left the factory. The ability of the carriage mechanism to be a buzzer rather than TT carriage got worse, and any amount of RC damping a fiddling with switch stops didn't improve it.

So now I have to tell my fed up and impatient client I will be forced to purchase a complete manual & schematic, and thus be able to check out what could be wrong.

I fully expect to see no explanation why an arm would buzz violently when the carriage stops to allow the arm to lower onto a record.

I won't mind if he doesn't want to proceed since the cost of spending days on one bit of gear would be expensive, even at my low hourly rates.

I repaired a Sanyo 4 in 1 stereo with a tracker arm, and it was SO much simpler, and worked just as well, same functions....

Patrick Turner.

Of course, with no experience and not even a circuit diagram.

Nothing rash about my assesment of YOUR statements.

Which I already stated!!!!

However it DOES make it more fool proof for women and children. The B&O was the only turntable I could trust them with, that I could also trust my records with. The B&O MMC20CL I used was quite a good cartridge IMO, and did minimal damage to records. (Unlike the Decca you mention!)

No assumption, YOU stated you don't give a shit, and I'm sure I don't care.

Gee, you must have *real* problems with modern gear! No wonder you stick to valves.

repair

No, most 30 year old junk is thrown away. The fact that it's worth fixing indicates it's not junk.

I'll sell you an old JH then if you like :-) Not sure if you can still get belts for them though? Does that count as bother?

fixed, and

risk of

Possibly, but that sounds exactly like what is happening with your repair too.

Since you haven't even told us what is wrong, just what help did you expect? Your not likely to get too much help by abusing people IMO.

MrT.

genuine

I quite agree with you, but only if the said repairer has some idea what he is doing. In this case Patrick has taken on a repair where he has no knowledge of the product, and apparently has no circuit. His attempts to fix it may be well meaning, but he is just as likely to damage something. (for example, cartridges are very expensive, and can be damaged easily if the arm lift solenoid doesn't operate properly.)

MrT.

Agreed, except that reputable companies keep records. Even new staff can access service manuals and lists of known problems, or special service precautions.

Agreed, both of which Patrick is lacking.

MrT.

I don't need to waste any time replying in detail to Mr T's blatherations, which mainly set out to discredit me.

He missed the part where I said I thought I would be compelled to get a workshop manual and schematic after spending more time yesterday on the POS B&O.

However, after an hour today I discovered more about what was wrong, and about what would never have appeared in the manual, since it involved a very slightly broken plastic part. Then there were some more obvious simple adjustments.

Once I fabricated a metal reinforcing bracket to beef up the plastic part and adjust a position of a solenoid, and an adjust screw to minimise the lateral play of the arm cariage, the chattering stop/start action of the carriage ceased and the item now runs flawlessly, nothing gets hot, and I was able to play several records ok. I think B&O have an inherent design problem with the 4000. The solenoid controlling the arm lift/set down motion pushes against a lever which stays against the threaded rod which is rotated to draw the carriage across the record. Clearly whoever designed it this way made a blue for not allowing enough space to prevent the solenoid shaft and lever striking the threaded rod and bouncing a bit, enough to make the solenoid act like a buzzer if the adjustments of solenoid position and threaded rod position are at extremes of their travel. Basically,things are too crammed in, and I wouldn't have been the first to find this problem. Anyway, the item is fixed now.

I might add I don't have a schematic and manual to use when playing chess in my local group of players; sometimes you just gotta come up with a solution without any aid.

The B&O cart has rather dull HF imho. The Denon 103 MC in a Thorens TD160 is far better.

( Never did I say I had a Decca.)

Patrick Turner.

"Mr.T" wrote:

I used to have V15. Denon MC was much better.

I am still seeking a scematic for the 4,000 TT, to check my work, even though it now appears to work perfectly.

The client wanted me to fix it before taking it to Melbourne when he leaves town, so there wasn't much time to order a manual from OS and wait a month for it to arrive.

There is a B&O discussion group to which I have subscribed, and gues what, another guy has the same trouble with vibrating/chattering arm when stopping/starting.

Don't worry Mr T, I normally perform blameless repair work on all items.

I must say your posts have not been of any real help.

Patrick Turner.